Car wash blues no more

Car owners know all too well the headaches that go into cleaning and maintaining a vehicle. Sunday mornings are usually spent washing, polishing and vacuuming, trying to get out the finger-painted “wash me,” someone put on the windshield. 

Maintenance on a car can cost the owner about $200 a month, minus gas and oil changes, but this is an expense most are willing to put up with to constantly breathe new life into a depreciating asset. There is no shortage of car washers or auto body shops in the country. You could even pay the neighbour’s child $20 to throw a bucket of water at your vehicle if you wanted. So when a group of business people decide to start up a new auto body shop, to compete in an already saturated industry, eyebrows are sure to be raised. But the owners of Auto Laundry Ltd, are dead set on monopolising this market. Basheer Baksh, Zorinda Baksh, Imamuddin Baksh and Sharina Baksh, two couples, decided a few months ago, to go into business together to create what they call the “largest auto-body facility in the country,” and possibly the Caribbean. On August 1, Auto Laundry Ltd opened its doors to  Chaguanas and the surrounding areas, the company’s core target.

The directors of the company have a knowledge base most new companies would envy. Basheer has twenty years experience in mechanics and automotive maintenance, while Zorinda has a background in engineering and logistics. Imamuddin and Sharina both have over twelve years experience in advertising and print production. Starting this business was, for the team, an intricate plan. They invested over $300,000 into the facility to ensure they had up-to-date machinery able to handle the expected capacity. The company also spent a month training and preparing a staff of twenty workers to handle the equipment in the shop, and staff was also put through a week’s orientation, including dry runs, before the launch. With all these plans in place for Auto Laundry, the Bakshs are almost sure top shake things up in the  care business. They know the investment was sizable for a first time business, but according to Basheer: ”If you want people to take you seriously, then do it large enough for them to see the difference.”

Auto Laundry will be managed by Basheer Baksh, with the other three as directors. But how different is this company from all the other auto shop stations set up throughout the island? According to Basheer, Auto Laundry will fill all the gaps left by the other auto-body shops. “You don’t have to sit under a tree on a wooden bench to wait for your car anymore,” said Basheer.  The four partners did local and international research, and this combined it with their own experiences, is going to give them the edge.  What they found was a market made up of two extremes: automated car washes or facilities set up under people house. They wanted a modern facility where one could get a complete service - and not have to wait more than half an hour. And, if indeed, they did have to wait, they wanted to do so in comfort. This is what Auto Laundry intends to give car owners. Their first step was to partner with an international conglomerate within the industry to give Auto Laundry its credibility and edge. The partners choose 3M Worldwide, an interntional company known for its its cutting edge innovation.

This co-branding partnership will allow the company to place 3M on all their material like T-shirts, pens and letterheads. It will also ensure that only 3M products are used in the shop, so people know up front what is used on their vehicle. Apart from their relationship with 3M, Auto Laundry has also contracted a Scottish company, Excel Cleaners, to handle the supply, installation and maintenance of all their equipment. Excel also assisted in the design and structure of the “wax while you wash” system. Basheer thinks that vehicle owners do not get their money’s worth at other auto body shops. “This is from my own experience, I was never satisfied with what I got. And I have seen situations where people complained openly about the quality of car washes,” said Basheer. Auto Laundry, situated on Mulchan Seechan Road Chaguanas, will have an output capacity of 250-300 cars per day. The site has nine service bays set up, in a semi-circle, a row of ten vacuum cleaners and a separate facility for buffing and polishing. The vehicles will not only be washed, but waxed simultaneously. This means wax will be dispensed from the wash hose along with the water to give the vehicles a high gloss, “new look” finish.

To differentiate the company from your “under-the- mango-tree operation,” as Basheer put it, Auto Laundry has a strict procedure for ensuring efficiency and maintaining its forecasted turnover per day. The idea is that customers won’t have to wait more than half an hour, said Basheer. Once a car drives into the service bay, it will immediately be taken to a supervisor for a thorough check of the body to record any damage to the exterior of the car. A check list is then filled out detailing what the customer wants. He will then be given a copy of the job card while the car is taken to the detailing bay. The customer has access to his vehicle at all times, Basheer noted. While there, you can sit in a comfortable, air conditioned lounge, watch Cable TV and have access to vending machines, snack bars, coffee machines — and clean bathrooms. “The experience of having your car cleaned does not have to be torture,” Basheer insisted. The owners are adamant that their business will succeed. “The facility will be a stroke under an automated car wash,” said Basheer. He added that all the research done showed international companies were moving away from the drive-through car wash and back to the manual car wash, because of the damage done to car bodies and under-carriages.